Thursday, January 29, 2009

For my 2nd international classroom blog, I have the honor of describing Ms. Thomas's classroom blog from Meadowbank School Room 23 in Auckland, New Zealand. The students in her class are ages 6-7. On their blog she has assignments the students have worked on such as making a planet explorer. A planet explorer is how the students show that they are able to identify the planets. She also uses this blog as a way for her students to place posts up to tell their parents, family members, and others (like you and i) about their class assignments for that day and/or week. I really like how she uitilized the blog to teach her students how to put posts on an internet's blog site. To check their blog out for yourself just visit meadowbankreporters.blogspot.com.

Wednesday, January 28, 2009

For my international classroom blog post, I found Ms. Rachel Boyd's class blog. The class is from Nelson Central School in New Zealand, Room 9. I have to say this is my favorite classroom blog by far. I love the way she organized the blog with the different tabs and colors. She has a photo album on the blog so anyone can check out photos of her students. Also on the blog is something that really impressed me. The students are doing podcasts(i believe)! They're doing podcasts about Lorax. They also have a little video of pictures that goes along with the podcast. To check on this classroom's blog visit the link http://room9nelsoncentral.blogspot.com/.

Monday, January 26, 2009

For my 2nd K-12 Classroom Blog that is being taking place in the United States, I chose Mrs. Lowe's Class out of Missouri.On the Classroom's website(http://schoolweb.missouri.edu/poplarbluff.k12.mo.us/lowe/)there is a link to the blog(http://plowe.edublogs.org/), which is titled The Lowe Down. Mrs. Lowe uses the blog to communicate with her student's parents and other classroom teachers. She has posts about what she will use to teach the students and ways she will help them learn through practice. She has links that parents or teachers may visit to help their children study. The links maybe to handouts, games, etc. She also has links that will take you back to the classroom's blog and to podcasts. Something very interesting about this blog was that Mrs. Lowe's recorded her students doing an activity and you can go on the website and listen to it. It's titled "Sweet Sounds of Learning". I enjoyed checking out Mrs. Lowe's classroom blog.

Thursday, January 22, 2009

This is a picture that I found on the classroom's blog spot. The students are watching President Obama's Inauguration.

This is a picture I found on the class's website of the students in class.

Hi, the first K-12 Classroom Blog I found was Mr. Langhorst's 8th Grade American History Class, which is a class that is taught at South Valley Junior High in Liberty, Missouri. The link to the classroom's website is http://www.liberty.k12.mo.us/~elanghorst/blog. On the website there is a link(http://www.speakingofhistory.blogspot.com/) which will send you to the classroom's blog. On the classroom's website, Mr. Langhorst has laid out a very resourceful page for students and parents. There are different topics/tabs such as: Course Description, which describes the course; Student Resource Page, where the students may find classmates' email addresses; Parent Resource Page, which has the same tabs as the homepage but in detail for parents; Teacher Resource Page, which teachers may find Mr. Langhorst's lesson plans and the type of materials he used with links to each; Contact Mr. Langhorst, which has his contact information; About Mr. Langhorst, which tells about his life; This Week In Class, this tab tells the student and/or parents what their child may have missed while out of class that particular week(s); Units of Study, describes the units the students will learn in class and activities for each; Student Project Showcase, has links that will direct you to the blog spot for student projects; Weekly Parent Newsletter, shows the newsletter the school sends out to parents each week which you may download; Class Pictures and Video, has class pictures that may have been taken in class or while on field trips and video which have been taped in or outside of class; South Valley Jr High Page, will direct you to the school's website; Mr. Langhorst's Podcast/Blog, will direct you to Mr. Langhorst's blog and podcast; and lastly Cool Links and Sites, which students may check out for extra study methods. On the Blog spot there are mostly podcasts and videos from class. There are also links for students to check out about American History.

Tuesday, January 20, 2009

My reaction to the Fisch Bowl Movie, which you can watch at http://thefischbowl.blogspot.com/2007/06/did-you-know-20.html, was that I was very interested in seeing what was going to be in the rest of the movie after seeing some of the facts and statistics it showed. The movie started with an interesting fact about how many babies are born in 8 seconds, 34 babies, which I though would be a much higher number. It also stated that there were 1.3 million 2006 graduates in the U.S., which I am proud to say I was apart of. But very unaware of, I did expect India to have more graduates than the U.S. at 3.1 million. This is very exciting to know and China had 3.3 million. The video stated the 100% of India's 2006 college graduates spoke English and in 10 years China will be the number one English speaking country. It said that many of the majors offered today did not exist10 years ago such as: New Media, Organic Agriculture, e-business, Nanotechnology, and Homeland Security. It gave statistics such as: today's 21 year olds have watched 20,000 hours of television, played 10,000 hours of video games, talked 10,000 hours on the phone, and have sented and/or received 250,000 emails or IMs. And I can back this up because I send and receive a lot of emails and IMs. :-) All of these were pretty interesting facts the video mention but this was not all. It went on to inform us about how future computers will have more knowledge than the human brain and some will exceed the computer capabilities of the human race in 2049! It ends with letting us know that we should prepare our students for jobs that do not exist so they will be capable of fixing the problems that do not exist!

Thursday, January 15, 2009

The Alabama Connecting Classroom, Educators, and Students Statewide (ACCESS) Program is a Distance Learning program for students. It provides opportunities and options for Alabama public high school students to engage in Advanced Placement (AP), elective, and other courses to which they may not otherwise have access. The students are allowed to take Advanced Placement courses during regular school hours through a web-based program, one-on-one lectures, and recently added, the students are now able learn through interactive video conference with their teachers.By visiting http://accessdl.state.al.us/, one could learn more about ACCESS and how it can accommodate you, your child, and/or student(s). The website has different tabs that you can go under such as About ACCESS, Courses, Students, Educators, Parents, Contact Us, Help, and Resources. Under About ACCESS, it describes the ACCESS program; under the Courses tab, it identifies the courses that are available through ACCESS; in the Students tab, it tells the students what type of activities and devices they should look forward to doing and using, it also shows the students were classes will be held; under the Educators tab, teachers who are interested in teaching in the Distance Learning program may see what jobs are available; under the Parents tab, it describes ACCESS for the parents, lets them know what their child will be learning, and where the classes will be held and where they are offered; under the Contact Us tab there is information such as telephone and email addresses which one can use to contact someone who works for ACCESS; the Help tab has frequently asked questions; and the Resources tab identifies the type of exams and tests the students will be taking. One can also take a look at a powerpoint on ACCESS at: http://accessdl.state.al.us/showaccess.php?Ink=aboutaccess. The powerpoint gives good information on ACCESS as well but in a simpliest form.The ACCESS program will be usefull to me because I am able to inform my future students and their parents about the program, for those students who want to take Advanceplacement Classes. It will also be usefull to me if I ever decide to teach a Distance Learning class.

Wednesday, January 14, 2009

The Alabama Learning Exchange, ALEX, is the Alabama Department of Education’s interactive Web portal. According to Shannon Parks’ article titled Alabama Learning Exchange: ALEX Web Portal, ALEX receives over 31,000 unique visitors per month. She also states that ALEX won a 2007 “Best of the Web” Award from the Center for Digital Education and Government, hosting, through the Alabama Supercomputer Authority, a rich assortment of interactive and resources linked to the searchable Alabama Courses of Study. Most of these activities are supplied by the Verizon Foundation’s, Thinkfinity.org, with over 2,000 lesson plans supplied by Alabama teachers. The resources are designed to engage students and teachers in 21st century learning, and expand new opportunities. Last year a training program was offered and available in every district to help teachers learn to use ALEX and Thinkfinity.org in their area of expertise. Parents are also able to help their child meet school expectations at home by using ALEX (http://www.21stcenturyskills.org).If one visits ALEX’s home site, http://alex.state.al.us, he or she will see that it’s full of life and color. It has different tabs on which one can choice that’s best fit for them, such as Courses of Study, Web Links, Lesson Plans, Search, Personal Workplace, Professional Learning, Distance Learning, and Help. In the Courses of Study tab it gives a description of what every grade level would or should be learning under each subject area. Under the Web Links tab there are links for teachers, administrators, and students. In the Lessons Plans tab a teacher can create a lesson plan and a parent can take a look at a teacher’s lesson plan. Under the Workplace tab a teacher may login to enter their workplace, which may contain any and all work such as lesson plans the teacher may have created using ALEX. The Professional Learning tab helps a person keep up with the latest news and find learning tools among other things. In the Distance Learning tab it will provide a person with access to the Alabama Connecting Classroom, Educators, and Students Statewide (ACCESS) program. ACCESS gives students Advance Placement opportunities that they may not usually have. The students attend web-based courses by using two-way video and audio devices. Under the Search tab one may search through the above tabs for assistance and in the Help tab there are frequently asked questions.ALEX will be a good use to me when I become a teacher because I will not only be able to use it to create lesson plans and such but I will also be able to inform my students and parents about ALEX. Therefore, parents will know exactly what their student(s) is learning and will also be able to assist them with such.

Saturday, January 10, 2009

Hi, my fellow classmates! My name is Angel Jackson. I am a rising Junior at the University of South Alabama, majoring in Elementary Education. I chose this field not only because I love kids but also because this is my calling. I love to have fun with children by playing games and teaching lessons. I enjoy incorporating a little fun into everything. My roommates always tell me "Your kids are going to love you because you're so fun." Currently I work at the Exploreum and for the University in the Communication Department. I have been working at the Exploreum for 3 years now. I enjoy working there because I teach the camps that it has open for kids during summer, spring, and winter breaks. While working in the Communication Department it helps me develop listening and communicating skills, which I will definitely need while teaching. I am so interested in how people learn so I'm planning to take up Psychology or Counseling after I finish my Education degree in 2010. Well...that's enough information about me. I look forward to learning about you all this semester.

Hi, readers and welcome to my blog, I hope you have a great time reading my blogs this semester(which I'm sure I'll have a wonderful time reading yours as well) and I will like to thank you in advance for being a reader.